History of Leith, Edinburgh

It is strange to think that if you lived in Leith several hundred years ago that you wouldn’t recognise the Town and I don’t mean in terms of building’s or architecture which constantly change over time but the fact that Leith as we know it simply didn’t exist allow me to explain.

The Leith of history was the area around the Shore this is where our ancestors lived and in fact according to archaeological evidence this was where “Leith” began between Burgess Street and the Tolbooth Wynd. South Leith (ie around the Foot of Leith Walk) didn’t exist in the sense that it was outside of what was considered to be Leith, in fact when the Preceptory of St Anthony was built probably around 1380 this was considered by the Church authorities of the time as being outside of Leith eventually this developed into the barony of St Anthony and had a Baron Baillie to administer this small area. The Barony of St Anthony only became part of Leith in the 1830’s when Leith became independent of Edinburgh. North Leith again was a completely separate area from the rest of “Leith” and in point of fact North Leith extended on both sides of the Water of Leith to include what we now know as North Leith along with the Coal Hill, Sheriff Brae and the area down to Parliament St also known as St Leonards . Also North Leith originally came under St Cuthbert’s however in 1128 during the reign of David I it was disjoined from St Cuthbert’s and given to Holyrood Abbey and so North Leith for centuries was Church property. However it should be noted that there is a great similarity between North Leith and South Leith in that both are very ancient Churches and both have their roots in a monastic past. Just as South Leith Parish Church is historically connected with the Preceptory of St Anthony and the Augustan Order of St John, North Leith Parish Church was connected to the Hospice of St Nicholas which stood in what is now the Citadel. Unfortunately we don’t know much about St Nicholas apart from that it was a Hospice for seamen and was probably founded in 1380 which raises the possibility that it was where Trinity House originated from. St Nicholas existed until 1656 when it was displaced by the Citadel and the churchyard of St Nicholas was moved to Coburg St. It should be noted that St Nicholas Hospice like the Preceptory of St Anthony’s had Royal connections. It was here in 1612 that Mr Muirhead the first minister of North Leith Church was buried in the St Nicholas Chapel which was on the site of Dock St. It would also appear that the Chapel had a Churchyard connected to it and it was that which was moved to Coburg St in 1656 and was the reason that when St Ninian’s was built it was built without a Churchyard as one already existed

It was because of the connection with Holyrood that North Leith was known as the Rudeside the word Rude in Rudeside being a play on Rood as in Holyrood. The first Church in the Rudeside or North Leith came in 1493 and was founded by Abbot Ballantyne of Holyrood and was called St Ninian’s it should be mentioned that a few years earlier in 1486 it was the same Abbot who built the first stone bridge over the Water of Leith and which existed until 1788 when it was demolished and replaced by the bridge which we now see at Tolbooth Wynd. With the building of St Ninians the bridge became a Toll bridge to maintain the Church.

At the Reformation North Leith was given to John Bothwell a favourite of James VI and he became Lord Holyroodhouse. From 1560 the Chapel of St Ninian and St Nicholas became ruinous however in 1595 the Church and manse of St Ninian was rebuilt and by 1606 became the Parish Church of North Leith. It should be noted that the original building of St Ninian was a Tower Church which is extremely rare in Scotland and this was only recently discovered when the Cockburn Association redeveloped the site. Apparently over the centuries new buildings were attached to the building and then it was surrounded by Victorian Warehouses that the original building was hidden. Only with their removal and the subsequent archaeological study was this discovered.

Unlike the Incorporations of South Leith the Trade Incorporations of North Leith were linked to the Trade Incorporations of the Canongate and had their Altars and Chantries in the Abbey Church and not at St Ninians, this started because originally the Abbots tenants would have gone to Holyrood and because the Incorporations were small the practise continued. The most important Incorporation in the area was the “Ship Carpenters” who had their convening House in Sandport St now long gone. The term Carpenter was the term used for a Ship Builder and not what we mean by a Carpenter nowadays.

St Ninians continued until 1824 when the congregation moved from the old St Ninian’s to the new Church built in Madeira St. St Ninians had become too small and was crowded with galleries and was becoming very unhealthy.
The most famous family connected to North Leith was the Gladstone’s and the great Altar Tomb of Thomas Gladstone can be seen in the Coburg St Churchyard and he was Grandfather to the great Victorian Prime minister William Gladstone. Thomas was a Corn Merchant on the Coal Hill and this is where Sir John Gladstone was born and he was the father of William Gladstone. The family later moved to King St unfortunately the house doesn’t exist as it burnt down in 1897. Sir John built St Thomas Church in 1841 on the Sheriff Brae. Also in the Churchyard can be seen the tombstone of Dr Johnston who served North Leith for over fifty-nine years from 1765-1824. Even at the age of eighty-two he could walk all the way to Glasgow from Leith and back again.

North Leith today is the result of a number of re-unions and this can be seen over the door of their halls in Madeira Street as can be seen the stone plaque of the burning bush from St Ninian’s Ferry Road. However this isn’t the sign of a dieing Church but of a church which is very much alive and is still serving its community as it did several hundred years when Leith never existed.